Welcome to Public Administration and International Affairs at the Maxwell School

Skills, knowledge, and perspective — for people who plan to change the world

Maxwell is home to the nation's number-one Master's of Public Administration degree (according to U.S.News & World Report), providing a skills-based education that is concentrated and broadly applicable — for leaders within not only the public sector, but anywhere leadership is essential.

In the same department, Maxwell offers an ambitiously interdisciplinary MA in International Relations, combining scholarly coursework with global internships and selected skills instruction. This program was recently ranked top-15 by Foreign Affairs.

And alongside those is an array of powerful joint degrees, including Public Diplomacy, the Master's of Public Health, and the two-continent Atlantis Program, among others.

Maxwell graduates are famously inventive and savvy. Employers trust them to possess not just the skills of leadership but that special combination of big-picture thinking and connect-the-dots pragmatism that makes PAIA alumni especially valuable.

What makes Maxwell special? It's all these things . . .

Faculty. At Maxwell, students learn from senior, full-time professors who are also great researchers and/or former practitioners in public affairs. They're accessible. They're concerned. They're mentors. And, students will tell you, they're colleagues.

Interdisciplinary Extras. Because Maxwell is also home to scholarly degree programs in the social sciences — and 10 research institutes on such topics as public policy, global affairs, national security, public health, and conflict resolution - students encounter innumerable opportunities to combine their MPA or MAIR with research and specialized instruction.

Global Reach. While the MPA prepares students for management and policy careers in all settings (domestic or international), the MAIR integrates a required global internship. IR students benefit from academic and practicum opportunities in close to 20 countries — or in Washington, D.C.,
where the
Maxwell-in-Washington programs are co-located at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

Alumni Connections. PAIA alumni bring passion to their careers in government, NGOs, the policy sector, and other public and quasi-public organizations — the same passion they bring to their Maxwell affiliation. Students graduate into a community of loyal alumni in 149 different countries on whom they can depend throughout their own great careers.

The value of the Maxwell School approach is borne out in employment outcomes. The most recent post-graduate employment survey (from 2015) shows a 94-percent pre/post-graduate employment rate for
MPA and
MAIR graduates. The majority of the 2015 graduates finalized their positions within three months of graduation (though many, in fact, had found positions even before graduating). Additionally, the versatility of Maxwell’s MPA and MAIR is evidenced in
the breadth of sectors where employers are represented, and by the diversity of functional specialty required in the 2015 graduates’ new jobs. Breadth and diversity of that kind bodes well for career growth over the years and decades to come for these recent graduates.

To learn all the reasons Maxwell is a great place to launch a life of service, responsibility, and understanding for the public good, visit
Why Maxwell?. Then visit
Degrees to explore the programs that generations of former Maxwell students have used to launch some of the best careers in public affairs.

Len Burman was interviewed for the Atlantic article, "The United States Is Already a Low-Tax Country." "We’re on the hook for a lot more spending in the years to come," says Burman. "It makes some sense to fund that rising spending obligation with a [value-added tax on goods]. But Republicans won’t even consider it."

William Banks was a guest on Bloomberg Radio's Politics, Policy, Power and Law for the segment, "Federal Judge Questions Enemy Combatant Detentions." Banks discussed how long the Federal government should be allowed to detain legally detain a U.S. citizen before letting them challenge their detention.